Five for Friday

Women in Clothes. You can participate.

UK high street chain River Island have opened an online store for Australian customers. To celebrate, they have free shipping on all orders over 20GBP until this Sunday 9 June. 

Bluer Denim: A kickstarter project that aims to recycle your old denim jeans. Not sure if they post to Australia but if they do, I'm keen, this is a great social and retail project. 

 

Women's fits and styles. Image courtesy of The Bluer Denim Project.

Gorman have collaborated with a bundle of Australian artists to make incredible 'adventure' sneakers. 

Rachel Castle's adventure sneakers. Image courtesy of Gorman. 

Run Pee - the ap that tells you when in a movie to run for the toilets so you won't miss too much. 

This is one for all my pregnant friends out there - and there are A LOT of you! This website will tell you how popular your chosen name has been since the1880s. Also a bundle of other info.

This will surprise no-one but my name doesn't even have a ranking. It has not ranked on any countries' top 1000 names since The Dawn of Time. 

So it would be a great name if any of your were having girls. Just sayin'.

A belated birthday gift from Heartbreaker Fashion

I love vintage clothing. Just about all my favourite items of clothing are vintage. I also love vintage re-creation, which is all about flattering cuts and fun fabrics that you don’t see on ‘fashionable’ clothing. Unfortunately, re-creation vintage can also come with a price tag that is out of my tight budget range.

However, a couple of years ago I found Heartbreaker Fashion, a vintage inspired clothing company founded by a Californian mother and daughter team. Their clothes are simple, comfortable and flattering. Unless you order from the ‘fancy’ ranges, the dresses are 100% good quality cotton, well made and perfect for the Queensland climate. Best of all, they are very reasonably priced. A friend and I each treated ourselves to two dresses as a ‘test run’ and are still happily wearing them a few years later.

My previous purchases; 

Super Spy Dress Anita in Black. Made of cotton knit, it is perfect for evenings out in Brisbane.   
Aimee dress, colourful and comfortable cotton. Mine is a different pattern.

 Images courtesy of Heartbreaker.

So when a good friend gave me some money for my birthday to spend on a ‘nice top’ I knew just what I wanted. I had seen this photo on the Heartbreaker website a few weeks before and been completely seduced. It was exactly how I wanted to look!

 Ella top in Turquoise Cosmic Dot. Image courtesy of Heartbreaker 

For good measure I threw in the same blouse in leopard print (because who doesn’t love leopard print) and I was very tempted to get this super-cheerful daisy top as well, but I chose to be restrained. 

 Ella top in Hip Kitty and Springfield.

They’ve only been around a couple of days but I am really happy with them. They are great for work and casual and are a great fit. Downside is I (theoretically) have to iron them, but I can cope with that in exchange for looking adorable. In fact, I can get away without it. Which I always will, if I can. Ironing sucks.

Me in my two new purchases, with appropriate shoes; leopard print on the left and turquoise frilled leather BCBG Max Azaria on the right. The latter bought at Retournez-vous second hand shop in Mooloolaba

The only negative was that it took 7 weeks for my two blouses to arrive. They ask for 7-10 working days to make the order, which is fine. But then the package was dispatched from the US and I watched in horror as the online tracker told me it had left the states, arrived in Brisbane, two attempted deliveries were made within 15 minutes on the same morning and then the package was on its’ way back to the states! WHY?!  

When it arrived back at Heartbreaker it was dispatched back immediately, first class. It still took 2 weeks to get here but nevertheless, it arrived on my desk safe and sound.

The delay in arrival was not the fault of Heartbreaker, rather the Postal Services, but that doesn’t make it any less irritating and of course the only people I could whinge to were Heartbreaker. They always responded politely to my emails and did whatever they could to fix the situation, which truth be told isn't a lot when the package is somewhere in transit over the Pacific.

Anyway, the package did arrive and I am delighted with the contents. So much so I rather want more of the same. Particularly as there is new one with a bee print on it.

Provided you don’t need anything in a rush, I would heartily recommend Heartbreaker for fun flattering summer dresses, simple vintage-inspired cocktail wear and now, cute blouse tops. 

Check out the Heartbreaker Fashion website or if you like them on Facebook, you can see latest design, what's cooking in their test kitchen and of course, sale items!

TV review: Pan Am

I am quite aware of how ridiculous it must seem, to be reviewing a TV show that only lasted one season before getting cancelled earlier this year.

However, I have only just discovered Pan Am and I thought the chances that other people had heard of it at all weren't high so I was safe to do a review without too much ‘Euch...so last season…’ eye rolling.

Pan Am, named after the iconic Pan American World Airways, follows a group of stewardesses and pilots living the glamorous life of Pan Am employees in the swinging 60s.  All the ingredients for a successful drama are there from episode one. The 60s had so much going for it as a decade for screen drama. Women's liberation, the Cold War, the breakdown of the traditional class systems to be replaced by an idealised meritocracy and the rise of the working woman. It's all there in Pan Am, perfectly exemplified by the 20-something girls taking charges of their lives, not prepared to settle just yet for marriage and children, but preferring to assert their independence and take to the skies.

The four stewardesses who make up the core team in Pan Am are led by Maggie (Christina Ricci), the purser and also the rebellious at-home-bohemian who is enjoying life to the full. Karine Vanasse plays the subtly chic and world-wise Colette, the only non-American on the team. Laura (Maggie Robbie) is the newest recruit, having run away from her picture-perfect wedding to join her sister Kate (Kelli Garner) in her life as an independent woman. But behind the perfect eyeliner their stories are so much more. Colette lived through the horrors of Nazi-occupied France, co-pilot Ted is intensely angry and unable to deal with the changing class system and Kate is drafted into the CIA and slowly drawn deeper and deeper into Cold War espionage.

Maggie, Kate, Colette and Laura. Exemplary Pan Am stewardesses.

Exciting ASOS news for the Aussie shopper

This might get some of my internet-shopping-addict friends excited. ASOS is soon to release two  Australia-first collections; a beach collection and a salon collection.

It appears Australians drop a ton of money on ASOS. So to thank us as a nation for our monetary commitment and because we have opposite seasons to the ones being spruiked by the main UK site, Australia is getting a preview collection, available to Aussie customers before anyone else in the world.

The collections are out 8 of October, but you can get a sneak peak online and also register for the first notifications.  

I don’t normally buy through ASOS, though I have been tempted in the past. One or two of the items in this Australia-first collection might make me change my mind. 

I want those earrings!

Five for Friday no. 24

Paramount Pictures' epic 100th anniversary photo as featured in Vanity Fair.

25 things you didn't know about Mad Men.

This post in A Pair and a Spare makes me feel better about my long-term secret desire to own sequined shorts.

Photo courtesy of A Pair and a Spare.

Geolocated tweets mapped in real time.

Grilled pineapple guacamole. I want it now!

Aftersocks!

Last Sunday night I got some of the niftiest socks ever!

Aftersocks! Care, share, wear a pair

Aftersocks are a fundraising project from the Rural Women of New Zealand. Made locally and with 50% local Merino Wool, all funds raised go to support communities in Cantebury and Christchurch to recover from the Earthquakes in early 2011.

Not only are they for a good cause, they look freakin' cool!

I love my new socks, which arrived courtesy of my fabulous sister in law. Chuck also got a pair, so if you see him wearing them, compliment him on his nifty charity-socks.

If you'd like some Aftersocks yourself, then go to the website and buy some immediately.

For all of you t-shirt fans out there…

…and I know there are a lot of you. It’s so wonderful to find a fun, fabulous t-shirt that’s a little unique.

You can’t get any more unique than these.

Made In The Now is a design project that releases a new t-shirt design every day, inspired by the news of the day. The last week has seen designs commemorating the last bull fight to be held in Spain, the appointment of a Town crier to the city of Liverpool for the fist time in 200 years and the death of a Hungarian pensioner after they won a dumpling eating competition.
It’s gorgeous and the designs are clean and fresh. If you like t-shirt or even a bit of couture satire, you should check it out.

Oh – and an added incentive – the t-shirts are only available for purchase for 24 hours. After that, there is no going back. You can’t purchase yesterday’s news, only todays.

T-shirt for 29 September 2011.